Re-usable holder for beverage container

ABSTRACT

A reusable holder includes a single length of durable elastic material, circular in cross-section, fashioned to form a first loop, a second loop, and a middle section handle assembly.

FIELD OF INVENTION

The present invention is in the technical field of beverage containers,and more specifically relates to a re-usable holder for a beveragecontainer.

BACKGROUND

Over the last few years many different sizes and types of refillable andreusable beverage containers have been introduced the the public. Thesecontainers are available in several forms: from seal-able sports bottlesto open-top containers to 64-ounce growlers designed for transportingbeer. The construction of these containers has increased insophistication in the last few years with such containers evolving fromthin plastic single-wall construction to vacuum-sealed insulateddouble-wall steel construction. These containers have become ubiquitous,and are intended for repeated, long term use often in harsh conditions.The sophisticated construction of these containers is designed with theintention of reducing heat transfer between the liquid inside thecontainer and the exterior environment, including heat from the hand ofthe user.

Nevertheless the majority of these containers are designed andmanufactured without handles, rendering the containers often times moredifficult to carry and in every instance reducing the benefit of thetemperature-insulating design by forcing the container wall to come intocontact with the hand of the user during transport and thereby causingundesired heat transfer.

Several after-market handles or holders, as they will be referred tohereinafter, have been invented which may be attached to beveragecontainers in some manner and solve the above problem to some degree.These holders provide a handle and allow the containers to be secured toa backpack or other such baggage or transport item.

These holders are typically comprised of a handle section, joined,coupled, or affixed to an attachment device such as one or two full orsemi-circular attachment ring(s) and made of a silicone or rubbermaterial.

However these holders are typically designed for plastic beveragecontainers and are not intended for the long-term use typicallyassociated with insulated double-wall steel construction beveragecontainers. Consequently these holder designs suffer from many designdrawbacks that reduce the lifetime of the holder and make day-to-day usedifficult.

Among the drawbacks of the existing holder designs are structural weakpoints that manifest at the points of joinery among the holder assemblyelements. These weak points contribute to the eventual failure of theholders, thereby significantly reducing the lifetime of the holder.

When viewed in cross-section these holders typically have a rectilinearprofile. The rectilinear profile results in lower tolerance for stressalong the length of the holder thereby reducing the capacity of theholder for load bearing and in turn reducing the lifetime of the holder.

Another drawback is the difficulty in pulling the attachment ringstypically found in these holders over the ends of the target beveragecontainers. The attachment rings are typically designed to beconstructed of flat rubber or silicon. The inner surface of theattachment rings are typically flat. This flat surface makes adjustingthe attachment rings along the length of the target beverage containerdifficult.

Another drawback is that the current holders are designed to bemanufactured using materials that limit the range of sizes of beveragecontainers to which the holders may be applied.

Therefore, a need exists in the field for a novel holder for beveragecontainers designed for long-term durability, easy re-use, high stresstolerance under load, flexibility and convenience.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention is a re-usable holder for a beverage containercomprised of a single length of durable elastic material, circular incross-section, fashioned to form a first loop, a second loop, and amiddle section of sufficient length to accommodate a handle assembly.The loops are sized to be smaller in diameter than a target beveragecontainer. The holder is attached to the target beverage container bystretching the first loop around one end of the container and thenstretching the second loop around the opposing end. The middle sectionis encased in two concentric pliable layers that provide enhancedstability and allow the handle to be molded to fit the user'sspecifications. The holder is manufactured from a combination ofresilient, durable materials and is designed to endure years of repeatedstress from extensive use.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The disclosure will be described in conjunction with the appendeddrawings, where like designations denote like elements, and:

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a holder for a beverage container shownattached to an insulated beverage container;

FIG. 2 is a top view of the holder described in FIG.1;

FIG. 3 is a cross sectional view of the holder described in FIG. 1 madeat point Si on FIG. 2;

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particularembodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the invention. Asused herein, the term “and/or” includes any and all combinations of oneor more of the associated listed items. As used herein, the singularforms “a,” “an,” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms aswell as the singular forms, unless the context clearly indicatesotherwise. It will be further understood that the terms “comprises”and/or “comprising,” when used in this specification, specify thepresence of stated features, steps, operations, elements, and/orcomponents, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or moreother features, steps, operations, elements, components, and/or groupsthereof.

Unless otherwise defined, all terms (including technical and scientificterms) used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by onehaving ordinary skill in the art to which this inventions belongs. Itwill be further understood that terms, such as those defined in commonlyused dictionaries, should be interpreted as having a meaning that isconsistent with their meaning in the context of the relevant art and thepresent disclosure and will not be interpreted in an idealized or overlyformal sense unless expressly so defined herein.

In describing the invention, it will be understood that a number oftechniques and steps are disclosed. Each of these has an individualbenefit and each can also be used in conjunction with one or more, or insome cases all, of the other disclosed techniques. Accordingly, for thesake of clarity, this description will refrain from repeating everypossible combination of the individual steps in an unnecessary fashion.Nevertheless, the specification and claims should read with theunderstanding that such combinations are entirely within the scope ofthe invention and the claims.

A new holder for a beverage container is discussed herein. In thefollowing description, for purposes of explanation, numerous specificdetails are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding ofthe present invention. It will be evident, however, to one skilled inthe art that the present invention may be practiced without thesespecific details.

The present disclosure is to be considered as an exemplification of theinvention, and is not intended to limit the invention to the specificembodiments illustrated by the figures or description below.

The present invention will now be described by referencing the appendedfigures representing preferred embodiments. A holder for a beveragecontainer includes a single length of durable, elastic material,circular in cross-section, fashioned to form a first loop, a secondloop, and middle section reinforced with two layers of moldable materialto comprise a customizable handle.

The first and second loops are sized to be smaller than a targetbeverage container. The holder is attached to the target beveragecontainer by stretching either the first or second loop around one endof the beverage container and then stretching the other loop around theopposing end of the beverage container. The holder can then be used as ahandle to easily transport the beverage container, or to secure thebeverage container to something such as a backpack. The holder is madefrom an assembly of materials all of which are rugged, durable, andhighly resilient to allow the holder to be re-used on containers ofvarious dimensions.

Referring now to the invention in more detail, in FIGS. 1-3 there isshown a holder 101 having a single continuous length of durable, elasticmaterial 102 (the “Length of Material”) (FIG. 2), circular in crosssection 309 (FIG. 3), fashioned to form a first loop 103 (FIG.1), asecond loop 104 (FIG. 1), a handle assembly 105 (FIG. 1) bound with atleast one fastener 106 (FIG. 2), and encased in a semi-rigid pliablemembrane 107 (FIG. 2); the membrane is encased in a semi-rigid pliablegrip 108 (FIG. 2).

In more detail, still referring to the invention of FIGS. 1-3, theLength of Material 102 is of sufficient length to fashion the loops 103and 104 and the section supporting the handle assembly 105. In the mostpreferred implementation, the Length of Material 102 has a total length,before fashioning the loops 103 and 104, of 660-720 millimeters. In themost preferred implementation, the loops 103 and 104 are fashioned withdiameters D1 (FIGS. 2) and D2 (FIG. 2) in approximately identicaldimensions, and both diameters smaller than the diameter of the targetbeverage container, such as the insulated beverage container 100 shownin FIG. 1. The holder 101 is placed on the beverage container bystretching the first loop 103 over one end of the beverage container andthen stretching the second loop 104 over the opposing end, resulting inthe configuration shown in FIG.

The Length of Material 102 is preferably made of any durable, elasticmaterial, having a roughly circular cross-section 309 (FIG. 3) thatenables the loops to easily stretch to accommodate beverage containershaving a variety of diameters. Any durable, elastic material orcombination of materials, man-made or naturally occurring may beemployed. One specific example that may be used is bungee chordmanufactured from natural or synthetic rubber and encased in layer(s) ofcotton or nylon yarn.

The Length of Material 102 that fashions the loops 103 and 104 overlapsitself as shown in FIG. 2 in the handle assembly 105 and is boundtogether by at least one binder 106 (FIG. 2). The number and type ofbinder used to bound the Length of Material may vary. At a minimum onebinding element must be used. The binder 106 may be made of aluminum,but any other material such as high strength plastic or metal or thelike providing sufficient binding strength to bound the Length ofMaterial may be used.

The dimensions for the holder 101 vary as needed to accommodate a rangeof different sizes and shapes of beverage containers. For use withinsulated beverage containers as shown in FIG. 1 the diameter D3 (FIG.3) of a circular cross-section 309 (FIG. 3) of the Length of Material102 is in the range of 5-10 millimeters. The diameter of the Length ofMaterial 102 can vary to accommodate larger sizes of beveragecontainers.

The loops 103 and 104 should have approximately the same diameter andlength, but the holder 102 will still function with slightly differingdimensions between loops 103 and 104. In one specific implementationsuch as the manner depicted in FIG.1 the diameter D1 (FIG. 2) of loop103 (FIG. 2) is in the range of 45-50 mm, while the diameter D2 (FIG. 2)of loop 104 (FIG. 2) is in the same range. The length of loops 103 and104 can vary to accommodate multiple sizes of beverage containers.

The dimensions of the binder 106 (FIG. 2) vary as needed to sufficientlybound the Length of Material. For use with the holder as shown in FIG.1the inner diameter D4 (FIG. 3) of the fastener 106 (FIG. 3) is 10millimeters.

Referring now in more detail to the invention as shown in FIG. 2 thereis shown the handle assembly 105 wherein the Length of Material 102 isbound by the binder 106. The handle assembly 105 is comprised of themiddle section 110 (FIG. 2) of the Length of Material 102 having lengthL1 (FIG. 2); encased in a semi-rigid pliable membrane 107; which is inturn encased in a semi-rigid pliable grip 108.

The width of the handle assembly 105 may vary depending on the size andshape of the target beverage container. For use with insulated beveragecontainers as shown in FIG. 1 the width W1 of the handle assembly 105(FIG. 2) is in the range of 30-40 mm and the height H1 (FIG. 3) is inthe range of 18-25 mm. The length L1 (FIG. 2) of the handle assembly 105can vary depending on the size of the target beverage container. For usewith insulated beverage containers as shown in FIG. 1, the length L1 ofthe handle assembly is in the range of 100 to 150 mm. These measurementsprovide a handle assembly 105 of sufficient dimensions to fitcomfortably and securely in the hand of the average adult user.

The semi-rigid pliable membrane 107 is preferably made from a resilientmaterial that allows the handle assembly 105 to bend based on thepreferences of a user but still maintain sufficient rigidity whencombined with the entirety of the holder 101 to support the weight of abeverage container. The thickness of the membrane may vary depending onthe desired rigidity of the handle assembly. For use with insulatedbeverage containers as shown in FIG. 1 the thickness T1 of the membrane107 (FIG. 3) is in the range of 1-2 mm. Any suitable resilient materialmay be used. One specific example of suitable resilient material isthermoplastic polyolefin, which once sufficient heat is applied, isshrunk wrapped to bound the handle assembly 105.

The semi-rigid pliable grip 108 is preferably made from a resilientmaterial that allows the handle assembly 105 to bend based on thepreferences of a user but still maintain sufficient rigidity whencombined with the entirety of the holder 101 to support the weight of avariety of sizes of beverage containers fully loaded with fluid. Thethickness of the grip may vary depending on the desired rigidity of thehandle assembly as well as the desired thickness to facilitate gripping.For use with insulated beverage containers as shown in FIG. 1 thethickness T2 of the grip 108 (FIG. 3) is in the range of 5-10 mm. Anysuitable resilient material may be used. One specific example ofsuitable resilient material is nylon Type III kemmantle rope, otherwisereferred to as parachute cord, paracord, or 550 cord. The cord is wovenaround the semi-rigid pliable membrane 107 until the entire handleassembly 105 is encased in cord, thereby forming the semi-rigid pliablegrip 108.

The advantages of the present invention include, without limitation: 1)construction from a single length of elastic material removes the needto attach, couple, join, or affix the handle section of the holder tothe portion of the holder that affixes it to the target beveragecontainer, thereby removing structural weak points present in the priorart; 2) an extruded circular cross section 109 (FIG. 3) constructionprovides an efficient shape to resist axial loading, adding enhancedstructural stability along the length of the holder, reducing wear dueto stress typically found at corners or at any points of joinery, andthereby increasing the lifetime of the holder; 3) encasement in thesemi-rigid pliable membrane along the handle assembly 105 providesenhanced stability in the handle assembly, significantly reducingwarp-age along the handle assembly 105 when used to carry a load and,the handle assembly 105 may be molded and adjusted to suit the user'sspecifications; and, 4) the semi-rigid grip exterior grip 108 adheredalong the length of the handle assembly 105 provides enhanced ergonomicfit for gripping as well as another layer of stability to resistdeformation caused by repeated loads.

In broad embodiment, the present invention is an article of manufacturecomprised of a single length of durable elastic material, fashioned toform a first loop, a middle section comprising a handle assembly, and asecond loop.

While the foregoing written description of the invention enables one ofordinary skill to make and use what is considered presently to be thebest mode thereof, those of ordinary skill will understand andappreciate the existence of variations, combinations, and equivalents ofthe specific embodiment, method, and examples herein. The inventionshould therefore not be limited by the above described embodiment,method, and examples, but by all embodiments and methods within thescope and spirit of the invention.

What is claimed is: A) A holder for a beverage container comprisedof:
 1. a single length of durable elastic material, circular incross-section, fashioned to form a first loop, a second loop, and amiddle section handle assembly;
 2. a first loop having a first diameter;3. a second loop having a second diameter; and B) The article ofmanufacture of claim 1 containing the middle section handle assemblywherein both ends of the single length of elastic material are bound,encased in a semi-rigid pliable membrane, which is in turn encased in asemi-rigid pliable grip.